Modern Communication
by Gemenied
Summary: An evening gone bad


Title: Modern Communication

Rating: T

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Summary: An evening gone bad

A/N: Almost a year it has been since my last story. Don't ask. But I might have actually managed to produce words. Just a few. Thank you to GotTea and missDuncan - and to Joodiff :)

Enjoy.

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 **Modern Communication**

It's one of those evenings that was supposed to be quiet and relaxed and then went down in a blaze of crap that comes down both through the phone and its e-mail app.

A quiet dinner at her favourite Italian, a bottle of wine. Another glass in the quiet darkness of her living room. He'd been smiling to himself when he thought of it, smiling at the possibilities the evening might offer.

He knew they needed such an evening, deserved it even.

But the best laid plans...

He looks up from the plate he has barely touched in the last minutes and catches a quick glimpse of her on the opposite side of the small table, notices how she slowly and methodically twirls the pasta around her fork.

No spoon, because Italians would consider that barbaric. She once told him that with a certain imperiousness that he found amusing and very provoking. Absolutely intended on her part.

This time the thought causes a knot in his stomach that he isn't sure will dissolve enough to swallow any of his quickly cooling food later. He had been hungry originally, but the events of the last minutes have taken care of that.

He knows this mannerism in her. It has never heralded good things. She's bored. And she's annoyed. Not that he blames her.

They've never discussed this, but he can easily guess what the eminent psychologist Dr. Foley would analyse out of his behaviour. It's not as unpleasant as to imagine what Grace will have to say. Or what she thinks right now.

He's been on the phone to either type messages or conduct phone calls since almost the moment they sat down at the table, barely put it away to choose his own meal. Conversation or focus on his companion... there has been none so far and he doesn't see it changing any time soon. The obnoxious DCI on the other end drones on about supposedly important evidence his team has found, but Boyd has yet to hear anything that pertains to their current, highly unpleasant, case.

They should have left the restaurant before ordering, or changed it into take away. Not the evening he had planned, but that way he would have spared her the embarrassment of having to basically eat alone under the curious eyes of other customers while he's busy looking important.

That is worse.

Of course, Grace knows better than any of those people that he didn't choose the constant barrage of communication he's currently involved in, but looking at her trying to extend the time of consumption tugs at his heart and at his guilty conscience.

He doesn't really hear what the DCI at the other end of the line has to say; he actually doesn't care. It earns him a few choice words from an officer of lower rank who is seemingly drunk on his own importance. Something about wasting time and having better things to do.

Well, he definitely has something better to do, Boyd knows that. She's sitting across from him and has taken to lying down her fork and looking around the restaurant after every second bite. She looks at him only for a short moment, before picking up her fork again, very methodically and slowly, and twirling a bit more pasta around it. He watches her, the way she goes through her routine of eating, laying the fork down onto her now empty plate and drinking from her wine in almost slow motion.

Watches the way she swallows, very slowly, and wonders if it really enhances the taste, as she claims. The way her throat moves catches his attention. He knows how soft her skin is there. Had plans for that soft skin, in fact.

The DCI is shouting into the phone, calling him a few creative names. None of them is polite. He doesn't reply, barely hears the words. His focus is on Grace, on the way the indirect lighting plays over her features.

Suddenly... the line is dead.

Boyd stares at his phone, rather disbelieving of the fact that it is unexpectedly quiet. His ear feels a cool draft, indicating just how long it's been covered by the phone. Sticking it into his jacket, he finally and with a sense of relief focuses fully on Grace, who watches him calmly, her face inscrutable.

"Grace," he says. It's not enough, he knows. No meagre apology will make this disaster of an evening better. "I'm..."

"Excuse me for a few minutes," she says and gets up.

He leans back and closes his eyes on a heavy exhale.

Damn.

It's going to be even worse.

The touch of her palm on his cheek comes as a shock, her lips on his even more so.

Her touch is gentle, but there is clear intent behind it. It's the mix that always, always wreaks havoc on his senses. The softness of her lips, the light stroke of her thumb along the side of his nose, the quick teasing of her tongue. It never fails.

Much too soon she pulls back, looking at him intently with those mesmerizingly intense blue eyes. They see everything he says and does and all the things he doesn't.

"I'll be right back," she announces quietly and then adds even more softly. "Eat, Peter."

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Thank you for reading. Comments would be greatly appreciated.


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